The Phantom Rickshaw: and other Eerie Tales

Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) was born in Bombay and educated in England. Kipling returned to India in 1882 and worked as a newspaper reporter and part-time writer. The seven years that he spent in India, from 1882 to 1889, were an experience that helped him gain rich insights into colonial life, which he presented in many of his classic stories and poems. Kipling went on to write several books for children as well as post war stories and non fiction for adults. The Jungle Book, a classic of children’s literature, appeared in 1894, while Kim, the story of Kimball O’Hara and his adventures in the Himalayas, was published in 1901. Kipling’s other works include Plain Tales from the Hills (1888), Under the Deodars (1888), The Second Jungle Book (1895), Stalky & Co. (1899), Just So Stories for Little Children (1902) and Puck of Pook’s Hill (1906). One of the few writers to have gained popular and critical success, Kipling was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907 and the Gold Medal of the Royal Society of Literature in 1926. His autobiography was published posthumously in 1937.